Staff Week September 2021

Staff Week “From Cotutelles to Joint Programmes – Challenges and Opportunities”

Venue: The University of Bremen, Germany, hybrid format hosting 27 participants on site and up to 30 participants online

Date: September 21 - 23, 2021

After a lengthy delay due to the Covid pandemic, the Staff Week “From Cotutelles to Joint Programmes – Challenges and Opportunities” was successfully hosted in a hybrid format by the University of Bremen.

The staff week is one part of the Erasmus+ Project “Joint Programmes at Doctorate Level in a European university network: Linking Education and Research towards the European Education Area” (Link EDU-RES). The objective of this event was to gather the research on current practices with regard to cotutelles and joint programmes and discuss especially the role of the legal offices and doctoral schools at the partner universities. The staff week was attended by 57 participants altogether of which 27 were on Campus from the partner universities from Antwerp, Essex, Maastricht, and of course Bremen. The online participants come from all partner universities, other YERUN partners as well as from universities outside of the YERUN network, for example colleagues from the Association of North German Universities).

Inspiring keynotes, two round table discussions and presentations from three universities on their doctoral schools and approaches to joint programmes on the first and second day provided a perfect foundation to the working groups on day 3 that enabled in depth work on the topics supervision, top down or bottom-up and mobility. Project leader Dr. Pieter Spooren (University of Antwerp) wrapped up the findings of the Staff week in the closing session.

The Staff Week offered an open and inspiring setting for discussion of the project objectives. Participants returned to their home institutions with a lot of fresh ideas and plans for further collaborations. Alongside the official programme, the participant on site had the opportunity for social interaction, such as a Campus tour and a guided tour of Bremen as well as formal and informal dinners.

A second staff week hosted by the University Carlos III Madrid in March 2022 will give the opportunity to enlarge upon the topics discussed in Bremen and to present further findings